


Dam burst

by travellinghopefully



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Angst, trace of fluff, whouffaldi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-13
Updated: 2015-10-13
Packaged: 2018-04-26 04:49:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,805
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4990906
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/travellinghopefully/pseuds/travellinghopefully
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This was meant to be smutty shmoop - er....so....this is after Under the lake/Before the flood - the angsty version</p>
<p>There will be smutty shmoop - this isn't it....</p>
<p>This is a very frayed version of the Doctor</p>
<p>Does follow on from why he left her hanging - which was part of the prompt....sorry.....</p>
<p>There might be a declaration of love, maybe, sort of...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dam burst

“Tell her you’re in love with her, and that you always have been. Tell her there’s no point in wasting time. Things happen and its too late. Tell her. I wish someone had given me that advice.”

He heard the words over and over. 

Those and Clara saying.

“If you love me in anyway, you’ll come back.”

Telling him, he couldn’t leave her.

His held his head in his hands, sitting with his back against the console. The TARDIS was alternating between consolation and chiding. He had an assortment of parts around his feet, he appeared to be doing something. He wasn’t. He was just allowing the words to replay, over and over.

He couldn’t do this again. 150 years in stasis so he could come back to her. No, he couldn’t do this. He couldn’t risk her life again. They were so far beyond second chances now that he had stopped calculating the astronomical mathematical improbability of what they shared.

Thoughts of Missy always nagged at him. What exactly had she meant when she’d said she’d given her to him?

 

“Tell her.” “If you love me.”

 

His head clunked back against the warm metal and he sighed. He rubbed his eyes. 150 years of sleep, that had to be enough to see him through several months – going to bed was simply ridiculous. A whole room for sleeping, what was the point? He did remember when bed meant warmth, and comfort and softness – when he didn’t worry about what was under the bed, when he was able to close his eyes and there weren’t nightmares.

Why did O’Donnell have to say the names? He remembered everyone, every story, every face, every life. And everyone left. He would never leave Clara, but she would leave him. He discounted his lies about Galifrey. 

He needed to do something. She hadn’t finished her sentence, but he knew she was going to say, “you give me a reason to live.” That was not healthy. He had a duty of care, she should find someone, get a hobby, have a life – a life that wasn’t here, wasn’t with him. He wasn’t going to watch her die again. He wasn’t going to have her live a life where the only choices were bad ones – he wasn’t going to let her be him.

He went to make tea, most things were improved by tea and biscuits – he added a glass of whiskey. He seemed to like whiskey now. He shuddered at the memory of fish fingers and custard, what had he been thinking. Regeneration really was a lottery. He tried not to think what he’d given the Daleks.

She found him sitting in the kitchen – she’d stayed, not going home, she did that sometimes. He hated how grateful he was when she did. She went to make cocoa, she didn’t ask, but she place a mug near him. Another plate of biscuits. She didn’t tut at the tumbler and decanter, she did move them back to the cupboard.

He unconsciously hunched in on himself – the sleeves of his jacket, the hoodie underneath, pulled over his hands – as little a risk as possible of her touching him as he could manage.

He thought of her raised hand, he remembered her words, but more than that he remembered her face. So hurt, and he couldn’t explain, he wouldn’t. He tried not to remember the last time she had held his hand. When they’d run on Skaro. Her hand on his arm in the Drum. One more touch and the dam would break. He couldn’t show himself to her, he couldn’t do that to her. If he prepared, if he really focused, or was utterly distracted, he could just do it, the moment could pass. But not as it had been, then, just the two of them, her eyes, staring into his, and she expected him to touch her hand? He couldn’t do that.

 

“Tell her.” “If you love me.”

 

So many things he couldn’t do. Too many contradictions, conflict, paradox. How many rules had he broken? And he justified the cost, the death, the loss, the destruction. He had moved from compromise to absolutes too often. The greatest coward in the universe? That was probably true.

She’d moved her chair next to him, she was going to put her hand on his arm, ask him what was wrong? No, he couldn’t have that either. Time to go back to the console, take apart and put together something that didn’t need fixing. 

As he stood, his fingers brushed her hair. He tried to convince himself that it was unintentional, the feel of silk, electrifying him – the dizzying fragrance almost causing him to stagger. He didn’t hear what she said, he made no attempt to answer.

 

“Tell her.” “If you love me.”

 

Standing outside the door, the leaned his head against the wall. Maybe the library was a better choice? He could surround himself with books, she rarely interrupted when he read. She would probably go back to bed. Pudding brains and their need for sleep. He tried not to let his thoughts dwell on curling up beside her, tried not to think of the comfort of being wrapped in her arms, tried to keep away from the prospect of sinking into her touch. 

He heard the chair scrape across the floor, and he was still slumped against the wall. Part of him didn’t want to move, part of him wanted her to ask, part of him wanted her to find him. He sprinted down the corridor, momentarily heedless of the direction he had chosen – she couldn’t find him, he had to be strong, he had a duty of care, he couldn’t be selfish.

 

“Tell her.” “If you love me.”

 

He found himself in a corner of the library, he was almost certain that she didn’t know exited. Suddenly shivering, and overwhelmingly tired, he wrapped himself in a blanket, knowing it was pointless, the chill wasn’t external. He selected a book at random and commenced reading without any comprehension.

It didn’t matter what he did. All he saw was her face, all he heard were the words. He couldn’t do this. No amount of bliss was worth the pain, the cost. He kept telling himself that. Oh but her eyes, her smile, all of her, everything.

He couldn’t do this. It simply wasn’t fair. She deserved far more than he could ever offer her. He remembered her scrapbook, her dreams of travel. He’d given her that, but at what cost? He had changed her, an not all change was good. She deserved far more. Her own family, children, lots of children, the adventure of a life lived someone she loved.

 

“Tell her.” “If you love me.”

 

He couldn’t do this. And he knew he was negating her right to choose, he right to have a say. But she didn’t understand the implications, the consequences, he couldn’t put the decision on her. The choice was his – and if he truly cared, he would make her leave.

That was it, he would enlist Kate’s help. Explain it to her (well not everything), she would understand. It wouldn’t be like it was with Donna, she would have her memories. She would be happy, safe and well, have a life. He would keep her from harm, he would keep her from him. He would make the choice.

 

“Tell her.” “If you love me.”

 

He was back in the console room, he had no idea what he was holding in his hands, he was momentarily distracted. The TARDIS burbled at him and he realised he truly had no idea how much time had passed.

Clara appeared, dressed differently, handed him a mug of tea and a plate of toast. Morning then, or an approximation of morning. Was it the morning after the night before, or had more time elapse, how long had he been in the library?

He plonked the plate untouched on top of a pile of similar crockery. He wasn’t sure if that had been there before. He was mostly certain the mould that had started to grow wasn’t sentient, he put on the glasses, just to be sure. It was probably best not to let tings grow in the TARDIS, you could never quite predict what the exposure to time and the vortex might do to them. 

He needed a shower, he needed to change his clothes. His mind was wandering, he didn’t seem to be able to account for that either.  
Clara was talking, he wasn’t hearing or answering.

 

“Tell her.” “If you love me.”

 

He was on the floor of the shower, the water pounding down on him. Again, he didn’t know how long he’d been here. The shivering was worse, however warm the water. Clara was here, no she couldn’t see him like this. He curled in on himself, wrapping his arms round his head. Begging her not to touch him. The water turned off, she wrapped him in towels, he was whimpering. Don’t let her touch him.

His own body warred with him, aching for the touch, the caress he knew he shouldn’t give in to. Somehow he stood, the towels held as tightly round him as he could manage. It didn’t matter that his flesh was naked, it was his soul that was raw and exposed. He tried to retreat, he tried to get past Clara. He wasn’t sure how much the TARDIS was conspiring in this.

 

“Tell her.” “If you love me.”

 

Her hand on his arm.

Everything stopped.

Skin on skin.

Her eyes, he couldn’t look away. He couldn’t hold back and the dam burst.

He leant forward, his forehead touching hers. Every word he hadn’t spoken, everything he hadn’t shared, everything spilled from him in that moment.  
Her name, his love. He tried to hold back his need, his longing for her. He tried to keep something behind the walls that weren’t there anymore.

And still he wasn’t listening. He didn’t want to be there for the moment when she recoiled from him, horrified by all that he was. He braced himself and the moment didn’t come. She didn’t slap him for the lies, she didn’t slap him for trying to take her choice from her, she didn’t retreat in rage and horror and fury. She remained, leaning into his touch, her hand still on his arm.

When did he not see her? Her love for him pouring from her. He gasped, and she slapped him now, when he questioned her love, when he tried to persuade her that she didn’t understand.

She showed him the moment when she leapt into his time line, over and over.

No one really know, things happen and then its too late.

Let me love you, let me have the time that’s appointed us.

**Author's Note:**

> So, hated this, tell me, loved this, tell me, really loved this - share!
> 
> And yes, I am pretty much whouffaldi trash - the bit on the phone, where he slumped into the console, yeah, that....
> 
> "Tell her." "If you loved me."


End file.
